


Noonan's Espresso Bar

by Shipping_Addict



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: AU, Age Difference, Bratty Kara, F/F, Lena and Andrea are in their 50's but pass off as being in their 40's, Mommy Kink, Mon-El is mentioned in passing but won't show up I promise, Past physical abuse, Sugar Baby Kara, coffee barista kara, kara is 23, mukbang youtuber kara, my best boi krypto, this is very loosely based on a hot older woman I pretty much simped over at my last job
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:02:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26083135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shipping_Addict/pseuds/Shipping_Addict
Summary: Kara’s cheeks tint a light pink. She’s always had a bit of a weakness for the beauty of older women. Alex used to joke that she probably had Mommy issues, but she doesn’t like to dwell on that thought too much, afraid of knowing the answer, and also partly afraid of making the ghost of Sigmund Freud just that little bit stronger.Older women really were something else.AKA the sugar baby Kara/Older Lena AUORThe aspiring Youtube Mukbanger Kara AU
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor/Andrea Rojas, Lena Luthor/Andrea Rojas, Samantha "Sam" Arias/Alex Danvers
Comments: 36
Kudos: 276





	Noonan's Espresso Bar

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, I haven't written a story since like...2012. This is my first Supergirl fic, so please be gentle. I have had this idea in my head for years (ever since I met the woman that I based Lena off of). Older women are a different kind of beauty that is not appreciated enough I stg. Also how come I have yet to see a fic where Kara is a Youtube Mukbanger/competitive eater? Clearly I had to do that myself. Also I'm aware that Noonan's is a restaurant/bar but this is an AU so...bare with me and let's pretend it's a popular cafe that sells overpriced drinks. On that note, please enjoy! I have no idea how many chapter I want this to be. I'm running on a few hours of sleep so whatever mistakes that are in here, I'll fix later.

“Damn it,” Kara whispers to herself as she rubs her hand along her face, her monthly bills carelessly discarded on the floor as she lets out a loud groan and drops her head onto her table.

“ow…”

Already behind on two months worth of rent and this month's bills in her possession, Kara really doesn’t know how she’s going to scrape by. Her two year old samoyed, Krypto, whines and anxiously fidgets beside her chair. She absentmindedly places her hand on his soft head and strokes back and forth to calm him down. He could always sense when her anxiety would start to peak. For as long as Kara can remember, she's always been taken care of. Whether it was her foster mother, Eliza, lightly fussing over her comfort with them after her foster dad, Jeremiah ,passed away, to ex boyfriends telling her that she didn’t have to worry about a damn thing—it really hit her like a ton of bricks when she realized that she’s never truly been left on her own before. She’s single for the first time in a long time—that she can remember anyway. Her foster sister, Alex, is busy working at the hospital, and Eliza is back home in Midvale.

Hell, it wasn't till she graduated from college that she realized she made a huge mistake with her boyfriend at the time. She had relied on him to the point where she would turn down invites to hang out with her friends--made up excuses that they bought for awhile until they outright stopped asking her to go out with them after work. With Mon-El as her only company, she felt lonely, which resulted in her being more clingy. When they graduated from college, they got an actual apartment together. In theory it wasn’t much--more open space than anything and a partition separating the corner of the apartment they used as their ‘bedroom’. When Mon-El would come back to their apartment, he basked in the attention that Kara gave him; puffing out his chest when Kara would tear up about how much she missed him. It worked for a bit at first--she would meet him at the train station and they would walk the rest of the way home and chat for a bit, maybe have sex, and then go to bed. The sex wasn’t particularly great--Mon-el was the type to finish and then ask if she came as well. She’d lie and say she did, and he would knock out quickly after. It wasn’t much, but Kara needed that time with him.

After a while though, Mon-El got more irate. Maybe it was the constant time apart; Kara had to be at Noonan’s by 6:45am to open and make sure the cook wasn’t waiting outside for too long. She’d work for nine hours straight, sometimes not even having time to eat breakfast--more often than not she’d have to skip lunch, too. Her job was to feed other people, not herself. Mon-El wouldn’t start his shift at the bar until 3pm, Kara missing him by an hour after closing up for the day. After cleaning the bar and taking the train home, Mon-El wouldn’t be back until almost 1am. Rinse and repeat for a year and...yeah. Some days were better than others.

There were some days where Mon-El would be pissed after his shift. His boss or a customer giving him a hard time, and he’d end up yelling at Kara when she would try and talk with him when all he wanted to do was play video games or go to bed. It got to the point where they argued so often that Mon-El hit her to shut her up. And it worked to the point where that’s how he got her to shut up whenever he didn’t want to talk, which was often. Especially after Kara was tipped off by one of his coworkers that Mon-El was cheating on her with one of the new bartenders. He didn’t appreciate the accusation, and after finally being able to catch up with Alex--lying that she wasn’t paying attention and walked into a door and gave herself a nice shiner--

“You’re such a klutz,” Alex fondly tsked. “Come on, I have a salve that’ll help the pain.”

Being the type of girl where relationships defined her existence, Kara can now see the downsides to it. You stick around for too long even though there’s a part of your brain saying that you shouldn’t. If it wasn’t for Alex reaching out after noticing Kara sheltering herself off a bit more than usual after her black eye--maybe she’d still be with him if she hadn’t shown Alex the covered up bruises she had. Mon-El had given her Krypto the first time he had hit her. He must have cared...right? Krypto never warmed up to Mon-El and stayed by Kara’s side a lot as a puppy. He would even wiggle his way between them in the middle of the night, which Mon-El didn’t appreciate.

After a domestic abuse charge and a threat from Alex’s cop girlfriend at the time, Maggie, Mon-El was out of her life. She had never seen Alex so livid at someone before.

While she did have some savings in the bank that was separate from her grocery budget, Kara’s apartment certainly wasn't cheap and honestly, most places in National City weren't particularly cheap either. Midvale housing prices had nothing on National City rent. She'd blame Alex for this issue because back when she and Mon-El were looking for a place, Alex had wanted them in a “safer” area of National City—but her rent was only doable when her job brought in enough tips. On days that tips weren’t that great, she had Mon-El to rely on to pay the rest of the rent. Lately though? People just weren’t tipping well, and her bank account was really starting to feel it. God forbid she brings up wanting a roommate; Alex had practically chewed her ear off that night.

“Did you not see that story about the girl that got a new roommate and he ended up killing his girlfriend? Kara, people are fucking shady around here. Over my dead body will you live with some stranger.”

As much as she loves her sister, Alex could fret over the smallest possibilities...just like Eliza. Last time she used that in an argument, Alex refused to speak to her for two whole weeks.

Noonan’s isn’t the worst job in the world. Kara loves her customers; she met and befriended her best friend Winn because of it, and yeah...her coworkers could be a little less lazy, but they’re not the worst. She’s dealt with them for three years...what’s another few more? Kara shuffles through her bills once more and sighs. This. This is what will continue if she doesn’t find a better job. Krypto let’s out a small ‘boof’ in agreement. She honestly doesn't know how she's going to pay her bills this month.

* * *

Winn grunts as he hits his hip against his apartment door a few times. A few moments later he hears the excited thumping of Kara rushing across the living room to throw open the door.

“I love you so, so much,” Kara sighs as she grabs the takeout bags from him and closes the door with her hip as Winn takes off his shoes in the hallway.

“Do you order from them often? The guy behind the counter seemed really bummed out that I came to pick up your order instead of you.”

“Juan likes hearing me speak Spanish,” Kara yells from the kitchen. “He likes how excited I get when he gives me a free tortilla with fried beans and some chorizo!”

“You’re going to need this entire container of salsa verde? Kara…”

“It’s essential; I enjoy flavor!”

“Each taco has a double tortilla-- you’re going to get a stomach ache!” Kara’s response is the sound of the lid from a jar being unscrewed. Followed by another, and then another, and then… Winn dubiously eyes the ten large mason jars full of horchata that Kara has just popped open and is pouring into her favorite comically large cup, lovingly dubbed ‘The Water Cup’. Winn has never once seen Kara drink water out of said cup. For someone that doesn’t drink much water, her skin does look fantastic. Winn absentmindedly scratches at his dry cheek.

Looking over the buffet of food that she ordered for the night, Winn still doesn’t understand the appeal that Kara was trying to explain to him over the phone. Random strangers watching you eat mass quantities of food online? Apparently there was a big following for...muckbanks? Yeah, that sounds about right, he thinks.

Winn quickly counts off 10 containers, totaling 40 soft al pastor tacos. Winn is aware of how much Kara can eat, but 40 tacos? She was practically asking to get a tummy ache. He looks to his overly cheery friend for guidance.

“Alright, now I just gotta rearrange these bad boys like so…”

“You...have to arrange your food?”

“Duh! People like when the food looks aesthetically pleasing. Which is why I moved them to this serving tray that I got from Dollar Tree.”

“Dare I ask how you managed to pay for all of this,” Winn mutters as he sets up his tripod. “I expect that venmo transfer after this is over, by the way.” Kara freezes mid pour, pointedly ignoring the stream of horchata that splatters noisily onto the counter and tiled floor. Considering how cheap it was to make the stuff, she isn’t tempted to madly lap at the floor like Krypto does on the rare occasion that she spills some juice on the floor.

“I may have...um...used the last of my grocery budget.”

Winn raises a brow. “You mean the $50 you found outside my apartment, which I’m pretty sure was mine--”

“--but it’s an investment, Winn! I really think I’ll be able to live off of this!”

“You think you can make enough money to finally be financially independent,” Winn deadpans. “By eating. For strangers on the internet.”

Kara shrugs as she mops up her puddle of horchata. “It’s more difficult here than I had anticipated, Winn...in college Eliza paid for my apartment, and then after I had Mon-El to rely on to help with rent...my job at Noonan's barely covers my rent, and the bit of money I make from these videos helps me get my groceries for the week and food for Krypto.”

Winn scratches at the back of his head. “And your commissions from painting?”

Kara scoffs. “If I have to do one more redo of that darn cow--”

“But you love cows.”

“I do! But that guy is so weird! His original request was to have some kids suckling on the udders of a cow--”

Winn grimaces. ” That’s...a really odd request. It’s for that guy that owns your favorite pizzeria, right? Is it personal or for the pizzeria?”

“I think it’s for his living room? But I didn’t like how the first painting came out and he was understanding. He loves cows and wanted something maternal, which is why he wanted kids suckling on udders--the udders would represent life because that’s the cow feeding her children--Then he wasn’t fully satisfied with my second attempt and honestly neither was I...and yeah, he paid for my materials each time but...ugh. I’ve been working on that painting for months now, Winn.”

“Maybe you should try getting a sugar daddy,” Winn snickers.

Kara glares at him. “I already tried that. Don’t remind me of it.”

“Oh come on, Kara. It’s pretty funny.”

“What’s funny about losing $30 because you put some partial trust into an online stranger that allegedly had trust issues,” Kara grumbles as she sits down in front of his tripod.

“Lesson learned. Don’t send money to potential sugar daddies that claim to have trust issues. Have them send you money first, or no deal.”

Kara rolls her eyes. “Never trying that again. The other guy that asked me to do his test of sending him a Steam gift card shouldn’t have been so obvious. What a waste of time and effort. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice...eating cup noodles for a week straight isn’t fun.”

Winn softens at that. “Look, I know it’s been rough for you...after being with Mon-el for four years--“

“Don’t kill my camera vibe,” Kara lightly jokes.

But Winn sees it; the little crinkle in her brow that Kara tends to get when she’s frustrated and stressed. Fuck that guy, honestly. Winn had never met him, but Kara told him enough about their relationship to make his blood boil; partial crush on his best friend be damned. You never hit your partner. Ever.

“But just keep looking and you’ll find something...you won’t be a barista forever.” Kara gives a small non-commital shrug and adjusts his tripod one final time. Once she presses the button on her phone to start recording, she puts an overly cheerful smile on her face.

“Hey, guys! So today I’m gonna talk about my crazy workday and share these tacos and homemade horchata with you!”

* * *

Winn briefly rubs at his eyes as he takes a short break from staring at his laptop screen. “You know you have your own apartment, right?” Winn tiredly asks Kara, who is laying face down, smack in the middle of his bed.

“Your bed is ten times more comfier than mine,” comes the muffled response.

With a belly full of food, and Winn’s soft Star Wars blanket rubbing her cheeks, Kara happily groans.

“Well you've been here for over three hours, left chip crumbs on my sheets--”

“I’ll clean it up.”

“--and you have your signature Kara pout on your face...what’s wrong? Kara rolls onto her back and softly whines. Winn raises a brow and crosses his arms as he leans back in his gaming chair. With her shirt riding up and exposing part of her belly, Winn is faintly reminded of that viral photo of a pup that always knocked out on his back with his limbs spread out.

“I don't know how I'll pay my bills on time this month...let alone my rent,” Kara quietly admits.

“Oh,” Winn murmurs as his brows knit in concern. “Well, have you asked your sister--”

“I can handle it,” Kara snaps.

“Clearly not if you're worried...what's so bad about asking your sister?”

Kara scoffs.“Alex doesn't think I can take care of myself,” she grumbles. “And you know what? Maybe she's right--I clearly can't if I'm close to being evicted from my own apartment! I'm just a little girl that always needs her hand held!”

“Being an adult isn't easy,” Winn nods. “There's nothing wrong with getting a bit of help, Kara. I had to ask my parents for help with rent for a bit when I moved out, before I got my job at Catco."

“Do you guys happen to be hiring,” Kara sarcastically grumbles.

“Well, Ms. Rojas is looking for a new assistant--”

Kara practically shoots up from her position on Winn’s bed.

“Seriously? Why didn't you tell me this sooner??”

“She's--not very nice?” Winn stutters. “And she yells. Like, a lot.”

“So? I can handle yelling. Ms. Grant used to yell at me all the time until I burnt her milk the way she liked it when you used to pick up her coffee.”

“You literally almost started crying the other day when that customer yelled at you for forgetting his danish,” Winn frowns. “You still looked upset about it when I came back a few hours later for another dirty hot chocolate.”

Kara deflates. “I really need the money, Winn. I promise, I can handle it.”

“I can put in a good word for you, but I can’t guarantee anything.”

Kara sits up and makes grabby hands at Winn as a big smile appears on her face. Winn rolls his eyes and falls into her hug, his cheeks turning pink when Kara murmurs into his neck, “you’re the bestest.”

* * *

The following morning, Kara frantically types in a customer's takeout order into the register, as her coworker Leslie works on making drinks, and her other coworker, Lucy, waits tables. Once the patient guy has paid, she distractedly yells for the next customer, mentally groaning when the screen freezes up.

“I’ll take a large cappuccino with three shots of espresso, extra foam. To go cup, with a baby kale salad; dressing on the side. To stay,” a low voice absently recites.

Kara aggressively taps at the screen, pursing her lips as the screen refuses to cooperate. She goes to restart the system and once the iPad reboots and asks for the passcode, she punches in the order, and looks up with her mouth opened up to ask if that was all—but the words never leave her mouth. Despite looking a bit pissed off as she furiously types on her phone, this is the prettiest woman that Kara has ever seen (and she has a lot of pretty customers that stop by). The woman is probably only a few inches shorter than her, with long black hair tied up in a ponytail that’s starting to expose streaks of silver throughout, which kind of reminds Kara of a skunk...but in a good way. Her skin is paler, almost as if she doesn’t see the sun very much. Since she’s frowning at her screen, Kara notices the faint frown lines on her forehead, and the light dusting of wrinkles near her eyes.

Older women really were something else.

Kara’s cheeks tint a light pink. She’s always had a bit of a weakness for the beauty of older women. Alex used to joke that she probably had Mommy issues, but she doesn’t like to dwell on that thought too much, afraid of knowing the answer, and also partly afraid of making the ghost of Sigmund Freud just that little bit stronger.

Just from glancing at the woman’s black floral dress, Kara can tell that she comes from money; most of Noonan's clientele came from money. But just from the pearl necklace she was wearing, Kara can only assume this woman was from the more richer part of town.

“If that’s all, may I have your name please?” The woman looks up from her phone, her green eyes focused now completely on Kara. She raises an impatient brow. “Lena,” she rudely says, before looking back down at her phone again.

Wow, alright. A little less attractive than she was a few seconds ago, but fine. This woman has nothing on Ms.Grant, so Kara just gives her customer service smile.

“That’ll be $15.85, please. Feel free to sit wherever you’d like.” Once Lena brings up her payment app on her watch and taps it against the payment screen, it pings as a successful transaction, and she throws a few bills into the tip jar and walks over to the back of the cafe. Kara takes note that she goes to the final table that’s right by the entrance to the kitchen, away from all of the other customers. Kara quickly scribbles down Lena’s table number onto her ticket, and places it at the workspace table where Leslie is placing her finished drinks in front of each ticket.

“Switch with me,” Lucy hisses as she comes to the counter to bring some food to a nearby table. Kara frowns at her coworker in confusion. If it weren’t for the rush and the fact that her heart was racing a mile a minute, Kara probably would have questioned Lucy further.

“I don’t know what it is, but everyone is in a weird mood today and we both know you have better patience than I do. I’ll take orders while you use your charm on these assholes.”

If it were anyone else, Kara probably would have said no. But it’s Lucy; she respects Lucy both as a worker and as a person since they’ve been working together for three straight years and Lucy taught her everything she knows. Kara quickly nods as Lucy rushes behind the counter to get to the front to handle the next customer. Not wanting to keep the next table waiting too long on their drinks, Kara reads the next ticket and huffs when she sees it’s an order for six large iced chai lattes with both oat and almond milk.

Kara’s hands practically glide in the air as she goes through the familiar routine. Into three separate steaming pitchers...three scoops of Train brand chai powder, three pumps of Torani vanilla syrup, and equal parts almond and oat milk. Kara quickly mixes the powder into the milk and steams it till just warm enough to dissolve the powder, and only slightly melts the ice in her cups. After setting up six large iced cups in front of her, she quickly stirs her three pitchers once more and pours each cup half way with the chai mixture, and tops them all off with more milk to even out the concentrated sweetness and finishes off the drinks with a quick sprinkle of ground cinnamon. With Leslie busy yelling for customers whose orders were ready.

Kara rushes to the other side of the counter to bring a group of loud college girls their drinks. With some time left until her table's food is ready, Kara moves on to the next ticket to start their drink. Large cappuccino with three shots of espresso, extra foam. Oh. Despite still feeling the adrenaline from the rush, Kara looks over to where Lena sat herself. Her phone lay face down on the table as she scribbled onto a yellow notepad, her brow furrowed and the tip of her left thumb in her mouth as she concentrated on whatever she was jotting down. Despite not knowing anything about this woman, Kara liked to believe she could read people based on what their coffee preference was, so she decides to take a chance and alters Lena’s drink just a bit. With her milk finished steaming and the espresso in the cup, Kara pours a smidge of milk into the cup and tops it the rest of the way with foam. An extra dry cappuccino. With her other tables food ready, Kara quickly, but awkwardly, deposits Lena’s cup in front of her (no spill!) as she balances three plates, and then heads back to her counter for the rest.. Once back behind the counter, Kara takes a peek over to Lena’s table, and smiles when Lena pops the cap off of her cup and closes her eyes after her first sip. She licks some foam from the top of her lip and glares at her phone when it starts ringing.

* * *

Lena huffs out a breath as she irritatedly smacks her thigh as she finishes reading the message she was just sent. Why the hell were people so unreliable? Although she absolutely loathes comparing now to how life was when she was younger, Lena can't help but compare the two. Like honestly, hookup apps are just a pain in the ass.

Once she feels like she has found a decent enough person, they end up deleting their profile before she can even set up a ‘date’ or get their phone number. Or it’s the complete opposite and they quickly ask her out and hand out their number after a mere ‘hello’...desperation (masked as overeagerness) was never something she found particularly attractive. But at this point who is she kidding? Did she really expect this to be so easy? Only kids used Tinder, as far as she was aware (she realized very quickly that men her age that used this app were not particularly attractive or were creepy as hell. What was it with men her age letting themselves go, and still expecting women to get on their knees for them with just a snap of their fingers? What was she, 20 again? Please.)

At first she had made her profile to just lightly browse the type of people that used this app. But that got boring rather quick when all she saw were men her age acting like they owned the world and that whoever messaged them would be lucky to get a response. Lowering her age preference made the results...certainly more yummy, but then she ran into another issue.

Millennials are flakey as hell.

Putting pictures on her profile hadn’t even crossed her mind until her wife, Andrea, mentioned no one would really give her the time of day without at least one. So, Lena went the next best route and took a few personal photos from her camera roll that had never been on the internet, cropped out her face, and left one photo with Andrea’s face cropped out as well. She’d find a nice set of abs and get to chatting rather quick once the messages started to roll in. The few that weren’t boring and actually knew how to communicate--she rather enjoyed them. Eager things that were surprisingly respectful, compared to men her age. But every time she would talk about what she wanted to do with them in bed--they would express interest and make plans to meet up.

And then, nothing.

Either they would ghost Lena (her goddaughter Ruby recently taught her that term--poor thing wasn’t fairing very well on dating apps), or they would delete their profile before she could finalize their plans to meet in person. Trying to chat with younger women was even worse. They would like her profile, but never respond to her messages. What the hell was the point, then? Also what was it with women on these apps that were looking for friendships? It's a hookup app for God's sake. 

God, if her mother was still alive to see Lena and Andrea making their relationship ‘modern’... she would have had a fucking conniption.

If it were up to her, she’d just pick up someone from a bar, but no. She has to be ‘discreet’, which is proving to be far more difficult than originally anticipated. Lena looks up when she hears something shatter on the ground and then a groan follows right after.

“Kara for fucks sake,” a woman yells from behind the counter, milk pitcher hissing loudly in protest as she glares at her coworker. The barista that took her order earlier--Kara, sighs and bends over to pick up the wet broken pieces of the mug she shattered. Lena’s eyes drift down for a brief moment. Kara places the broken mug pieces into a paper bag that her other coworker quickly hands over, and then goes to the back to fetch the mop.

Well, one bright side to moving her company to National City; there’s a cute barista working in the coffee shop a few blocks away from her new office.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone else simping after older Lena? Just me? ok. 
> 
> Reviews are really appreciated so I know if anyone is actually interested in another chapter or not.


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